Childhood

You know how some stuff you really like but you can’t quite describe why? Yeah. Childhood is this. That may seem like a lazy blogger’s cop-out for writing anything worthwhile and, hey, maybe it is, but who cares if a) you’re reading this, b) the music is good, and c) points are made much better if there are three of them.Woozy, jangly pop that is gentle enough to not disturb you too much from your mid-afternoon day-dream, but catchy enough to still hold your attention. I suppose that’s why I like it afterall.Childhood - Blue VelvetChildhood - Paper W...

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Twisted

As much as I love looping experimental synth-led songs and bands with 15 members and 20 effects pedals, no frills punk still more than does it for me. And not even just the early and original punk of The Ramones and The Clash, I welcome with open arms bands carrying on where they left off.Apparently an off-shoot of two other Wales-based punk acts - State Run and Facel Vega – Leeds’ Twisted (internet-less as far as I’m aware) are unfortunately no more, but their angry strums, passionate growls, bags of energy, and bursting songs rarely passing the 2 minute mark live on in glorious MP3 form. For me, they kind of merge early Stiff Little Fingers...

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Birthdays

When writing blog posts, there are certain bands that - although you enjoy to listen to - you are never really sure if they will be appropriately appreciated by the public or even the wider music community. But then there are other bands that you immediately sense are destined for wide adoration after listening to just a few of their tracks.Birthdays are one of those bands whose hype is easily understood, and most of the reason the hype is so easily understood in all honesty is the one track Howolding Girls (which you may have heard or read of an earlier version, which was called Procreating Flower Bug). As much of a boring cliché it is, it’s...

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Happy Christmas

Happy Christmas music lovers of the world. Here's a little festive tune for you to enjoy - Stiff Little Fingers covering White Christmas live. My Dad thinks it's rubbish, bu I disagree.Have a good o...

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Justin Bieber's pretty eyes?

Selena Gomez - Justin Bieber's pretty eyesReported, Selena Gomez is apparently a fan of Justin Bieber's pretty eyes. Although she didn't confirm or deny rumor Selena Gomez is romancing Justin Bieber during a recent interview with Y-100 Miami, the Alex Russo of "Wizards of Waverly Place" has opened up that Selena Gomez finds Justin Bieber's eyes "very interesting". Selena Gomezmade the statement after laughing off rumor that the Grammy nominee's new song, "Latin Girl", is about her. Asked what would she call a song she'd write about her rumored boyfriend, Selena Gomez hesitantly said it will be titled "Brown Eyes". On the reasons why, she noted...

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Vanessa Anne Hairstyles Gallery

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Cute Hairstyles For Short Hair - Tips to Create Trendy & Cute Hairstyles

Cute Hairstyles For Short Hair include kicky cool to very professional hairdos. Most of the celebrities are flaunting these ultra-glamorous haircuts in various events and ceremonies. You can easily exhibit some of the trendy hairstyles by opting for short hair. It is always advisable to know your face shape in order to have most appropriate look this season.Tips To Create Trendy & Cute Hairstyles* Treating your hair with high quality shampoos and conditioners is important before designing your tresses. In order to flaunt the best celebrity hairstyle, you should preferably do a bit of research on the latest trends. Consulting a hairdresser...

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Curly Hair

The height of twee folk's popularity has been and gone, probably to a fair few people's relief - typical boy-girl harmonies, acoustic guitar strums, glockenspiel pings, cutesy lyrics, but too often had little imagination behind them. What can occur when a 'scene' fizzles out, though, is that all the popularity-chasing bands pack up shop and head on to new, now-hip ventures, leaving only those genuine bands from the lesser-popular genre standing.Curly Hair were never really your typical boring twee folk/folk pop duo, but could have been lumped in with the movement given their male/female harmonies, acoustic guitar, and odd use of glock, (plus...

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The Louche F.C. (Again)

Still haven't gotten over these since posting about them in August. Feel very teased by the small amount I have heard from them, in fact. Just re-stumbled upon the track (I Cannot Be) Much More Than This, and I really, really love it. The perfect blend of 90s 'gazey jangly pop, and fits in perfectly with my recent listening habits of Beat Happening and Galaxie 500.Motorcycle Au Pair is still pretty darn great, too. Still pop, but a bit more of a 60s vibe to it.More stuff soon, hopefully. The Louche F.C - (I Cannot Be) Much More Than This The Louche F.C - Motorcycle Au Pair ...

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Carrie Underwood Celebrates her Year 2010 Instyle Us Dec 10

Carrie Underwood Celebrates her Year 2010 Instyle Us Dec...

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Video: Smith Westerns - Weekend

Smith Westerns - Weekend from Fat Possum Records on Vimeo.I know they're playing us all like suckers, and I don't even care. Haven't been this excited for an album in a long time - Dye It Blonde is out on Fat Possum, January ...

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Saturday's Kids Update #2

More new sounds from the band that don't cease to impress me. It's a little boring to use the whole "maturing band" thing, but they kind of are - each new release brings tonnes of new ideas.MySpace here, more songs at Art For Blind's bandcamp here, online shop here, listen below or download a zip (with permission). Saturday's Kids - Whisper In My Ear Saturday's Kids - Theorem Saturday's Kids - Unattaina...

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New Yuck, Again

This is probably getting a bit boring, but Yuck have a new song and it's good. Can't wait for the full-length next year. Yuck - Holing ...

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Top 10 Discoveries of 2010

I didn’t listen to enough albums to make a "Top 10 Albums of 2010" list, but I did listen to lots of new music, so instead I’m making a list of my 10 favourite bands or labels or musical things that I found out about this year. These are things that I’ve really enjoyed, and hopefully you might not have known about and will enjoy too. So, in no particular order:H. HawklineH. Hawkline kind of came out of nowhere for me. One minute I’m listening to some brilliantly spooky weird folk songs on Huw Evans’ (H. Hawkline’s) MySpace to write a blurb for the Swn Festival programme, the next I’m watching Huw plus 2 friends play some brilliant psych surf...

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Art Is Hard

The music scene in the south-west is still a long way off from being anywhere near as busy or thriving as most other parts of the country, but that's not to say that there isn't anything good going on down in these parts. Art Is Hard Records are slowly making me believe that. Predominantly based in Plymouth, and sometimes based in Bournemouth and Portsmouth depending on university term dates, Art Is Hard is a DIY bedroom label in the truest sense of the word. Run by two friends, they are looking beneath each under-explored rock and in every nook and cranny in the area to find local bands doing something worth listening to, and they're doing a...

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Future of the Left: New Demos

Future of the Left have posted links to some new demos, which will presumably eventually appear on their upcoming third studio album, on their Facebook page. It's the first chance fans will have had to listen to what the Cardiff band has been up to since their line-up change earlier in the year, other than from live videos like this one. Stream the tracks tracks below. Future Of The Left - I Am The Least Of Your Problems (demo) Future of the Left - Notes On Achieving OrbitFuture of the Left - My Wife Is Unha...

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Conek4

I don't know much about drum and bass. In fact, I know hardly anything whatsoever, and to be honest, I don't like a whole load of it. Still, I wrote about Conek4 (real name John Barr, based in Cardiff) during my esteemed role as music editor of my student union newspaper a year ago and I like the music that he makes, in a kind of feeling drunk without drinking way. Some people who actually know stuff about music like it too, such as BBC Radio Wales' Adam Walton. Listen below and decide for yourself. If you're interested to read the interview I did with John in December last year, head here. To hear more, visit John's Soundcloud. John also plays...

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Sizzling Cheryl Cole Calendar 2011 – Official Photo Shoot

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The Pigeon Post's Great Mixtape Swap 3

The Pigeon Post is a blog similar to this one, only better. They too write words about some of the best new bands, but they also regularly gather up all the music community spirit through running their mixtape feature. Now in its third installment, this will be my first time to get involved which is, I know, a poor effort. The premise is as simple as it sounds. A bunch of people interested in music make a playlist of around 10 tracks of new, interesting, and lesser well known songs, upload it to a file-sharing website, and send the link to Matthew at The Pigeon Post. He then puts all of the digital mixtapes into a big e-hat, plucks out the different...

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Arc Light

The words to mention when describing Arc Light seem to be "lo-fi", "psychedelic" and "pop", but for me this is far too basic a reduction of the complex sounds coming from the project of Brooklyn's Ryan Gabel. In fairness to the bloggers and Last FM taggers, these are some of the words Gabel himself uses to tag his releases on bandcamp page. As well as that, Arc Light, in Gabel's words with Ashtapes, make the sound of "too much inspirational music" and indeed it's immediately clear from listening to his music the juxtaposition of a wide range of influences. Hints of psychedelic and pop are evident (the king of the combo Bowie comes across at times,...

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Thunder Bunny

It can sometimes feel a little false and pre-meditated when a modern band sounds exactly like the ‘sound’ from a specific era. Lots of the time it can be a sound fashionable at the time. The shoegaze scene is a clear influence on lots of the noisey and droney bands around today, and the Phil Spector wall of sound is seeing a good resurgence, too. IOf course it is increasingly difficult to be truly original, and it’s not necessarily a negative criticism of a band to sound exactly like the bands of a movement from yesteryear (The Horrors’ Primary Colours springs to mind, sounding a carbon copy of the likes of The Chameleons), but it can hint at...

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Well, This Is Just Darn Lovely: Teen Daze - Beach Dreams

I know it's not an especially sociable hour (in the UK at least), but Teen Daze have posted a new song on their bandcamp page and it's lovely. So lovely it even features Christmassy harmonies and jingly bells. Listen below, or at their bandcamp pa...

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Old Smile

Listening to my HypeMachine favourited blog-list whilst doing a bit of writing, two bands caught my attention enough to write a mental note to find out their name once I'd finished these few sentences - one with some wonderful psychedelic and jazzy pop reminding me of Connan Mockasin, the other bare and beautiful folk. Upon finishing the sentences and researching the names of these bands, the two bands were in fact just one, and this band was Old Smile.Old Smile is apparently the project of a Tom Herman, who is apparently also of the band Arches (who maybe I should check out more of). This information isn't particularly important. What is important...

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Sauna Youth

Having an obsession with the Ramones is no bad thing. Try to search for the word "criticism" on their Wikipedia page and you won't find it. Proof, if anybody needed it, that the punks are a perfect band to aspire to be like.Take Brighton's Sauna Youth. They might not sound exactly like the Ramones, but they certainly take a lot of influence from - from the simple, fast-paced, driving motorik-like drum-beat; to the raucous racket; to the general punk ethic. But far from being plain old punk rock (not that there is anything wrong with that, other than a band doing that today would be lacking at least a little in originality), the four-piece break...

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The Black Tambourines

Most holidays, I go back home to Plymouth to visit friends and family. It's nice to see them, but going back can be a little depressing with just how non-existent the music scene is in the South-West (beyond Bristol...) of England as a whole. That's why I assumed that the blog No Fear Of Pop must have made some sort of a mistake when featuring a band from "the very southwest of the United Kingdom". Cornwall's (Falmouth, to be more geographically accurate) The Black Tambourines are the perfect blend of everything that's big right now; surf, garage rock, punk, and noise. It might seem like a band trying to jump on the hipster band wagon, but it's...

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IT'S CHRISTMAASSSSS!

Christmas compilation album featuring the likes of Crystal Antlers, Coconut Records, and the first collaboration of stoner-lovers Best Coast and Wavves, streamable here. I'm not saying it's good, but it's certainly festi...

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On Lopez Tonight

Selena Gomez On Lopez Tonight Nov 201011-16-10 Selena GomezSelena Gomez hits up the George Lopez show.Selena Gomez Talks About Rubing Selena Quintanilla's Butt & Discusses Trip to Budapest and how it was filming out there.She also talks about recent football game she attended with Justin Bieber & Will Smith & She Talks To George About Singing in SpanishShe was actually able to speak! Remember the last time when she had to use a voice box because she was on vocal rest for work?! So the two joked about how the show footage wound up all over the world. Speaking of which, they chatted about SG's international travels, including her spy-like...

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Strange News From Another Star

Photo courtesy of Paul Gregory, Lense Eyes. Back in 2005, The Independent were correct when they wrote that “one way or another, we will be hearing quite a lot more of Jimmy Watkins.” Referring to an on-track incident where, during his career in athletics a few years back, Jimmy farted whilst lining up for a race, although The Independent, even after that, probably weren’t expecting for us to hear more of him quite in the way that we have over the past year or so. Indeed, the Jimmy Watkins in that article is the same Jimmy Watkins who fronts Cardiff band Strange News From Another Star and, indeed, also the same Jimmy Watkins who was asked to...

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Michael Parallax - Ghosts (Spirit Come In)

Yeah, more Animal Collective stuff. This time a chilled out sample-use from a song by the Florida-based Michael Parallax.Download Ghosts (Sprit Come In) from Pasta Primavera here, or tonnes of his stuff from his bandcamp pa...

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Oui Messy EP

Perhaps one of one of the most enjoyable parts of listening to music is being pleasantly surprised. It’s all too easy to dismiss a band on the blandness of their list of influences or the bagginess of their jeans (I jest, of course). Perhaps even better than that is being surprised when a band who have already put out some strong material come back with stuff that’s even better.I posted about Cardiff-based Oui Messy a few months back, based on one live performance and regular listens of a small collection of songs on MySpace, and listening to their most recent EP was exciting.Such is often the case with young bands the Oui Messy sound is a constantly...

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Fergalicious Fergie Glamour December 2010 Photo Shoot Scans

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Triptides

It's a Sunday, so this post isn't a long one, alright? Triptides are three American guys making surfy pop music who aren't releasing stuff through Holiday Records, but could be. Their six-track album/EP is downloadable for any name-able price (including $0) in the space below (or here if that fails), and is enjoyable on the ears....

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H. Hawkline

There’s lots to be praised for playing in a band, but there must be nothing more satisfying for a musician than releasing something that you can completely call your own.Cardiff-based musician Huw Evans has been playing in the bands of Sweet Baboo, Richard James, and Cate Le Bon for a while, and he’s even credited with assisting with some recorded Islet output, but only now that he is releasing a solo album under his H. Hawkline moniker may he be truly appreciated for his efforts.I made a bit of a bluff describing H. Hawkline in the Swn Festival 2010 programme as “psychedelic and gypsy-inspired folk sounds - often largely instrumental and almost...

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Beaty Heart: Free Song

I mention the words "Animal Collective" far too often. Whatever. This new Beaty Heart track reminds me of them, as well as The Ruby Suns. I really like it. Download "Lekka Freakout" from the box below. Oh, and if you missed "Cola", head to The Mix Tape to grab that or listen below, too. Beaty Heart - Cola...

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Living Rooms

It is dull and tedious to read so many bands said to be influenced by Animal Collective, but Animal Collective are almost a genre all of their own now. The biggest reason bands are compared to the Baltimore quartet tend to be either a tendency to opt for a worldly and ‘tribal’ drum sound, the recognisable heavy use of loops and effects, and unusual, drawn out, high pitched, harmonised (or at least echoing) vocals in the style of members Panda Bear or Avey Tare.Living Rooms are no straight up Animal Collective rip-off, instead borrowing bits and bobs (primarily the echoing, high pitched, unusual vocals), using them in as so far unused ways and,...

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Selebrities

This blogging world can be a fickle old place. It feels like some blogs will ignore a band if another blog has already covered them. Clearly if I went by that ethos, I would have very little content, but I’d also be going against the reasons I write here.Selebrities have been hyped from the four corners of the globe for a good few months already, but I’ve only recently discovered, and fell in love with, their music.Putting a charming twist on a number of different movements, Selebrities are less inventors and more recyclers, taking old things and using them in different, but still beautiful, ways. Clearly influenced from lots of the post-punk/goth...

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Boy or Bison

The amount of material I am stealing off of The Pigeon Post is becoming worrying. Luckily for me, he's a nice d00d and doesn't seem to mind too much. Plus, it's kind of his fault for posting so much material that I feel I have to share.Boy or Bison make hazy, almost lazy sounding, pop music that is indeed too good not to (steal to) share. With bits and bobs borrowed from other related musical genres (think along surfy, jangly, garage lines), Boy or Bison have a wide appeal - including mums, dad, granddads and grans - with their sound which, although not overly original since clearly heavily influenced by doo-wop, is well worth your time.They've...

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Gindrinker

When I was young, I used to listen to music with my dad. My dad’s a fan of Tom Waits, though evidently he was blissfully unaware just how terrifying “What’s He Building” might be to a young boy. Fifteen-odd years later, and I can just about listen to Mule Variations the whole way through without crying. To me, Gindrinker’s “Bob Grainger: Sexual Pervert” is Waits’ follow up.Opening with deep, heavy breathing which is then accompanied by birdsong, the track taken from the Cardiff band’s split release with Joy of Sex (out on I Blame The Parents Records in Septeber) is a fitting example of the weird and wonderful world of both Gindrinker and the...

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